Page 67 of A Song for Another Woman

I sing about missed dinners, backstage doors, and her sitting out front while I stood behind curtains. I sing about telling her she imagined pain because admitting it would have cost me comfort. I sing about a sentence she heard wrong and a marriage she read right.

I don't sing her name. Not out loud.

I upload it before I can back out. No cover art. No announcement. No caption except two words:For her.

At midnight, I turn on WHLR. The cabin is dark except for the radio dial and the laptop screen, where the numbers keep climbing in a way Duke would call historic if he could stop swearing long enough.

Emmy’s voice slips into the room. “Good evening, Harmony Ridge,” she says, warm, careful, and close enough to hurt. “You’re listening to Backroad Country.”

I sit on the floor with my back against the bed, guitar beside me, phone facedown, hands aching.

She doesn't say my name.

She doesn't play my song.

Of course she doesn’t.

I close my eyes and listen anyway.

Chapter Sixteen

EMMY

The fourth caller asks for Cade before I even get her name. Pop looks at me through the studio glass with both eyebrows up, one hand hovering over the switchboard like he can personally hold back the county if he leans hard enough.

I press my thumb against the edge of my notepad. “You’re on WHLR with Emmy Sutton. What’s keeping you up tonight?”

A woman clears her throat. “Well, honey, I was hoping maybe you’d play that new Cade Tyler song.”

There it is. Again. Behind the glass, Pop closes his eyes.

I keep my voice even. “We’ve got plenty of good music for you tonight, Miss...?”

“Loretta,” she says, softer now. “It’s just, that one about the radio girl. I thought you might want to hear it too.”

My chest tightens. The red ON AIR light glows above the door, small and merciless. “I appreciate you calling, Loretta.” My hand goes still on the board. “But I’m going to say this once because I trust y’all to hear me. I don’t spin Cade Tyler records on this show.”

A thin silence opens.

“They’re not records, exactly,” Loretta says.

My mouth almost breaks. Almost. “No,” I say. “I guess they aren’t.” No label. No rollout. No glossy cover. No money changing hands. No video of Cade looking wounded in flattering light. Just songs dropped into the world like open palms.

“That boundary still holds,” I say, and my voice stays steady until the last word, where it catches just enough that I know half the county hears it. “This room is mine. This show is mine. I decide what comes through these speakers.”

Pop’s face changes with pride and worry both at once. Loretta is quiet for a moment before saying, “Yes, ma’am.”

I let out a careful breath. “But if you need a song about somebody trying, I’ve got one for you.” I cue up an old Tammy Wynette track. When the music fills the booth, I take off my headphones and set them down carefully.

My hands are shaking.

Pop cracks the door. “You all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“That word’s gotten mighty thin around you lately.”

“I said what I meant.”